Adair County cancels classes Wednesday after 'substantiated threat'

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Officials in Adair County, Kentucky, decided to cancel classes Wednesday after receiving a "substantiated threat."

The district's superintendent announced that classes were canceled in a Facebook post early Wednesday. Superintendent Jason Faulkner stated in the post that the threat was reported to the school district early Wednesday morning and is under investigation.

"At approximately 6:30 this morning we were informed of a Snapchat and the contents of the Snapchat message contained a gun that specifically mentioned Adair County," Faulkner said. "When we were made aware of this our buses were en-route to pick up our students. We had to make a snap decision to redirect our buses and return our students home."

Faulkner said the timing of the threat was the driving factor in the decision.

"We're going to put the safety of our students first," Faulkner said. "There was no way we were going to allow students to come onto campus with even the slight potential of a threat."

The school district that instructions around 2,600 students is working with local police, Kentucky State Police and Secret Service to investigate the incident.

"We have issued warrants for the accounts through Snapchat to see if we can backtrack that to its origin, but that's a process," Faulkner said. "We're in the midst of the process."

Faulkner said it was a generalized threat that wasn't directed at a particular school.

The school district is working with it coaches and faculty to provide extracurricular activities available on Wednesday.

"I don't want to completely cancel everything because a lot of our kids work very hard with extracurriculars, I don't want to take that away from them," Faulkner said. "We're working on extra precautionary safety measures to bring those kids back on campus. I've already been in contact with our city police, they're going to send several patrol cars on campus during those activity times as an extra safety measure. We're going to keep our students indoors. Any sports teams practicing outdoors will move indoors."

Adair County Schools hasn't yet decided if students will return to class on Thursday.

Faulkner encouraged parents to speak to their children about the dangers of social media.

"Talk to them about the severity of the things that they post. It may be a joke, it may be something they post light-heartedly, but if it's threatening in content, threatening in nature, we have to take it serious," Faulkner said. "There are going to be repercussions to that. We urge them to not put themselves in a vulnerable position of posting something that could get them into trouble."

The superintendent also acknowledged the difficult situation parents were put in so close to the start of the school day.

"If you're a parent at 6:30 in the morning, you're getting your kid ready, making sure they have their materials, you're on your way to school, and we called school off that late," Faulkner said. "I apologize for that. I appreciate the support. I appreciate the understanding."

Bus drivers also faced a challenge in returning students back to their homes

"I don't think we practiced or it's in the manual to do a reverse drop-off after you've picked them up at 6:30 in the morning. Our bus drivers were fantastic," Faulkner said. "Within a matter of 25 minutes, we had all of our students who had been picked up dropped off at home."

Classes were also canceled Wednesday in Taylor County after similar threats, the district said in a Facebook post late Tuesday evening, adding that "none of the online threats have been validated, however, I must err on the side of caution to ensure that students and staff are safe and prepared as we move forward with our school year."

The cancellation comes the same week that several schools in Jefferson County stepped up security after receiving verbal and written threats.

Two teenagers were also arrested earlier this week and charged after threats were made against TK Stoner Middle School in Elizabethtown, and Marion County High School.

The threats at local schools have been especially concerning in the wake of a shooting at a Georgia high school last week that left two students and two teachers dead.

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